“Hey guys.” my apparent teacher said with a soft smile, as she fiddled with the lock on the door to our classroom. Instantly, the mob of students crowded in the hallway parted, to reveal her tugging open the worn wooden door. She straightened up and beckoned us to go in. I watched from my vantage point on Gabby’s shoulder as the crowd of teenagers began to file into the classroom, chatting amongst each other. My cousin walked up to our teacher last, and I was regarded with the classic look of curiosity as she took me in. But what can I say? I expected that much from my peers. Mum had filled me in on everything. What I didn't expect though, was my teacher's first sentence.

“Hi girls!” She beamed. "You must be Amy, am I right? It's been a while since... since I had someone like you in my class." There was a sharp pause between her sentence, where she brought her hand to her cheek and exhaled. I could only guess the cause. From what Gabby had old me during her stay, this teacher had been working there when Marcus had attended St Agathas. Apparently, he'd been in her home class, and the two of them had become pretty good friends. The mention of the boy's name always made me feel hollow inside, despite my best efforts to keep my confidence up.

“Well, my name is Ms Harrington." The teacher continued quickly, recovering from her moment of grief. "I’ll be your home teacher and maths teacher during your year. I’ve put you next to Gabby here in the seating plan. I'm sure she'll show you around. There's even a... um... small desk in my prep room, that one of my students used to use. he was like you."

“I know about Marcus.” I said gently, forcing a smile. "Thanks."

Mrs Harrington opened her mouth as though she wanted to say more, but closed it abruptly and continued inside the room. Eventually, Gabby and I followed. As soon as she'd chosen one of the desks at the back of the room though, all eyes were on me. Someone gasped loudly. A few people began muttering in hushed words to each other. The girl who'd asked for my name before smiled.

I bit the inside of my mouth as the nerves settled back in. After a minute, I leapt off my cousin's shoulder onto the hard wooden desk below, earning a few more gasps of shock from my peers. It made me want to groan.

Seeing no improvement in their interest in me, I focussed on the room’s contents. Ms Harrington had closed the door behind her and was settling herself down on a larger desk at the front of the room. Overhead was a clock that ticked away in the background. A huge blackboard stretched across the wall with haphazard scribbles and notes on its surface. Bookshelves containing textbooks and what looked like calculators lined the other walls. There were a few pictures hanging up here and there and posters littered any space of wall that wasn’t already covered. It was just like the classrooms I'd read about and seen in movies. The only thing odd about it was, well, me.

Ms Harrington coughed loudly and to my relief, most of the staring teenagers swung back around to look at the teacher. She placed her work bag on her desk and stood in the centre of the front wall, the same gentle smile on her face.

“You guys must be so excited to start the school term after a long break! Anyone wanna tell me something interesting that happened to them?” She asked the class, clapping her hands together.

 A few hands were raised. Gabby’s was one of them. Ms Harrington’s eyes scanned the room and she pointed to the gangly kid who'd apologised to me earlier. He seemed fairly nice.

“Yes, Daniel?” She said. The boy lowered his bony arm and grinned.

“I went to see my uncle in America.” He told the class, and I couldn't help but frown to myself. I'd never been anywhere, really, let alone somewhere as distant as America. Was this one of the things normal sized teens could get to do all the time? Travel? Man, it sounded awesome. Ms Harrington continued pointing to the teens with raised hands and listening to their stories. I listened in intently, too. It was a relief to find that most of the stares had gone... all but one.

It was a boy, tanned and visibly muscled, with sharp ice blue eyes and an intimidating glare. I almost yelp at the hardness behind those eyes as they took me in. They radiated hunger. Power. I forced myself to concentrate on the rest of the class, but my legs were shaking uncontrollably at the thought of those giant eyes, scanning me over like prey.

Mrs Harrington pointed to Gabby and smiled. "Yes, Gab?"

“I went to see my cousin for the first time.” She said, and my worried expression melted into a grin at the realisation that Gabby meant me. Now, there was only one guy left with their hand raised. I gulped loudly, noticing that he was that kid with the tan and blonde hair I’d just had a stare off with.

“I went to see my mother in prison, cause pretty much all the tiny people in the world hate her.” He said with exaggerated enthusiasm when Ms Harrington addressed him. Some people laughed. My eyes widened and then narrowed in on him. What did he mean by tiny people hating her? Somehow I had a feeling that this was aimed directly at me. Ms Harrington rolled her eyes at his answer.

“Very funny, Thomas.” She sighed. The boy, Thomas, smirked back at her, although in seconds his eyes were trained on my again. I did my best to ignore them, but I couldn't shake off the feeling that he had something against me. That comment he'd made- what exactly did it even mean?

 Ms Harriet silenced the class with a clap. “I was actually going to introduce our new class member, Amy Leebeck, but as she’s already been very subtly mentioned by our new class clown Thomas, I don't feel the need to anymore.” She said. "I think Thomas should introduce her for us."

In response, Thomas stood up and glared at me icily before speaking. “Yes, this is Amy. Let's all just take a minute to congratulate her for trying to fill Marcus's shoes as the school's midget.” He said with a voice laced with sarcasm. I chewed on my lip; this guy was making it painfully clear that he didn’t like me. I was tempted to yell at him but shut my mouth almost immediately after I went to open it. He'd mentioned Marcus's name, like it was a sick joke. Why would he say things like that?

Ms Harrington rolled her eyes again and walked up to stand in front of Thomas’s desk with her arms folded. She put her face up right next to his and hissed so quietly that only I could hear it:

“Your parents are going to receive a little call from me about this. You are 16, yes. But you obviously still act like a baby because you’re judging people you haven’t even met. If you criticise this girl or anyone else for that matter, I will personally see to it that you are suspended.”

Thomas blinked in shock and nodded, but there was the same smug defiance in his eyes. "You'll have a hard time getting onto my real parents, seeing as one's dead and the other's locked up for something she had no control over." He muttered, too soft for the teacher to hear. I caught every word though, and it sent shivers down my spine. I stared down at the desk below me and tried to focus my entire attention on its surface. It only worked for a second.

 Mrs Harrington regained her original posture and smiled at the class. “Well, we’ll start with a little revision worksheet I have for you. To refresh your memories.” She said, her voice quivering slightly as she spoke. She began to pass out huge A4 sheets of crisp white paper, bigger than my bed. There were scratching sounds of the teenagers writing in answers in pencil as they received the quesions. When she reached Gabby and I, her eyes flickered to me.

“You can share this desk with Gabby if you’d like, or there is an empty one for you beside her.” She said with a smile. I nodded, and she handed me a smaller A7 sized piece of paper which I gripped with both hands. Printed on it were a neat set of questions.

My teacher shrugged. “It’s the smallest size we can give you. I can’t even read it but I’m sure you can.”

 I smiled gratefully. “No, this is perfect. Thanks.” I said. The teacher placed an A4 sheet next to me for Gabby and moved onto the next student. I shuffled to the edge of the desk with my own paper so she could have room to write.

“I can’t believe you can read that!” Gabby marvelled, squinting at the words on my tiny sheet.

"Well, you can't cheat off me, if that's what you're thinking." I laughed, giving her a lopsided smile. Gabby grabbed a pencil case from her bag, which was sitting next to her chair and pulled out two pacer pencils. I looked at the heavy things awkwardly, knowing one of them was probably for me.

"Uhhhh..." Gabby began, placing the second pacer at my feet. We both giggled at the sheer size difference.

“Thanks.” I said, wasting no time in gripping the tip of lead at the top of the pacer and snapping it off. It was probably miniscule to her but fit in my hand perfectly. Gabby huffed a laugh, and the two of us began filling out our sheets. Some of the maths stumped me, but I didn’t find the work too confusing, mostly because I liked to read in my spare time. I don’t even want to know how many mathematics books I’ve read in the past. Well, obviously enough to let me skim through the sheet quickly.

I laid my pacer lead on the desk when I was done and waited. I decided to smile casually at the people catching glances of me from their seats. Not many people were done, so I sat patiently, taking in the class. I caught the Thomas kid looking at me again, but this time I stared at him back with the same amount of ferocity as he'd given me before. Our eyes locked for a moment, but he turned away soon after, clearly startled by my comeback stare. I smirked to myself at the change in his attitude.

We were handed two more worksheets after the first one and I seemed to finish them easily, which made me realise just how much of a nerd I truly was. I really needed to get out of the house more... The teacher looked at my work through a magnifying glass, which was a little awkward to be honest, and nodded.

“Good work. I’m impressed.” She muttered, before turning to address the rest of the class.

****

Why did she look at me? I knew who the shrunken was, of course. It was the doll-faced girl I’d seen earlier in mum’s folio. Amy. I felt a sudden urge to run and grab her, but forced the thought away.

Not yet, I told myself. I could get her later. It wouldn’t be as easy, though. She seemed to be glued to Gabby, the annoying chick who hung out with a bunch of skanks. We'd been friends once, when Marcus was around, but now I was so isolated from the rest of the class that we barely even exchanged a smile.

 I snuck a glance at Amy. She was looking the other way, peering intently at the classroom. I wondered if she’d ever left her house before; I have to admit, as much as I hate them, the shrunken make me curious. Once I pictured myself that size, traipsing around avoiding feet, the way Marcus used to without me. The thought left my head as quickly as it came.

]I focussed back on my work dully and scribbled in a few answers. My mind was side-tracked though,  by Amy. The stare she'd given me before radiated defiance. She was different from the others. Too... relaxed. I expected that much from someone who'd never been normal sized, though. Even Marcus hadn't been that calm in the beginning.

Ms Harrington whisked over so suddenly I jolted in my seat. She said nothing, but whipped my worksheet away and gave me a stern look. I glared back icily. I wasn’t in the mood to behave.

"Take another look at question three, Thomas." She snapped, but said nothing more, instead placing my paper into her folder and walking away. I sighed to myself and rested my head on the desk sleepily, thinking of ways I could confront the Amy girl.

****

Class continued like this for a good hour and a half before another ear shattering ring of the school bell sounded. I held my hands to my ears to mute the noise.

“Next lesson, people. Good work today though. Thomas, stay back. I want to talk to you.” The teacher called. I slid my little piece of lead into the pocket of my jeans and glanced up at Gabby as she packed her things away. Ms Harrington had collected our work sheets beforehand.

Our next period was art and because it was early April, we were decorating the shells of Easter eggs. I used a bunch of hair to paint mine. The theme of our egg project was to capture a normal part of our lives in order to ‘appreciate what our lord Jesus has sacrificed his own life for’, according to our teacher, Mr Archwood. Gee whizz that guy was religious. The whole 'catholic school' thing was really growing on me. The egg itself was wider and only slightly shorter than me so it provided a perfect big canvas. The other students were fiddling with their huge paintbrushes as they tried to include intricate details and designs. I decided to draw my perspective of looking up at the kitchen.

I dipped my jumbled strands of hair into the coloured paints and blotted a rough sketch of the back of my head on the base of the egg. I made my hair flow around me like a rush of long black swirls and added tiny white specks of paint for detail. My picture started to come to life as the kitchen bench stretched around my egg like a long stripe. I painted the faded pink and white tiles and the fruit bowl and sink. I almost felt guilty painting it; I mean- compared to everyone else, my life was pretty boring and dull. Staring up at the kitchen in the morning was quite possibly one of the most exciting things in my day, and that was only because I got to eat at that time! I loved food...

Gabby glanced across at my sketch and dropped her mouth. “Wow Amy! You’re so good at this! I can’t get in any detail on this tiny thing!” She muttered, holding up her egg in annoyance. She’d drawn herself amongst a bed of flowers that looked like the ones in our garden.

 “Yours is beautiful!” I said encouragingly. She looked surprised at my comment but shrugged.

“I spose I need to work on the colours.”

 I continued painting, adding colour to what was once bare. Well, that was what I was doing in technical terms. I tried to think like that for the rest of the day, and soon for the rest of the week. Adding colour to a life that was dull and bland. I started to talk to people, show them what I could do and in turn, make friends. I guess life was like that; unpredictable.

Of course, Thomas made no effort to communicate, but I received about a million snickers and frowns from him every day. I was never too sure of why he hated me, but eventually, his blonde hair and wondering eyes blurred into the crowd of students. I didn’t think anything bad would happen to me at school. I let things slide when they got tricky and soon, everything was almost okay. Until, it happened, that is.

****

How could I get her? She was never alone- always with someone. Her friends, her mum and her little brother. She was always staring curiously at me in class, and I hated it. I gave her dark stares when she looked, causing her to avert her gaze and redden. I watched her go about her days happily, almost easily. She reminded me so much of Marcus in that sense.

I started following Gabby and Amy home on my bike. They got lifts from someone, Gabby’s mum, as I suspected. I learnt that Amy lived nearby, off the suburbs and out near the country. Her house was small, almost like a cottage, but it had two floors and a nice enough garden. I don’t judge people by their houses, of course.

I decided after a while to confront her after Gabby’s mum had dropped her at her house gate. It took her a while to walk from there to her doorstep so all I had to do was sneak up on her, climb over the fence with a jar perhaps… The possibilities were endless.

I learnt a little bit about Amy before I got her alone. She could do what people called free running or parkour. It was like acrobatics. Pretty much all the shrunken could do it. I watched her sprint up her driveway and backflip onto her doorstep, or dive through a gap in her fence to get inside. She was good at it- better than the others. I wasn’t worried about it, of course. She could run fast, but I could walk faster. She could dodge but I could grab. I could put a jar over her as easy as putting a jar over an ant…

****

Weeks passed so quickly, to the point where I barely had time for mum and Max with all the homework. My brain was always tuned into work and study and never seemed to register people around me.

That was probably why I didn’t register the dark, hovering shadow nearby as I waved goodbye to Gabby and her mum in the afternoon, after they dropped me off at home.

I stood on the rough pavement and turned to walk inside. The sun cast a warm glow over my skin. I clambered up onto the doorstep and prepared to shout out for mum but suddenly the warmth faded. A cold shadow washed over me like a wave and I spun around in shock. My eyes didn’t have time to take anything in before I was shoved into something hard and clear. I let out a startled yelp, but when my head whacked the side of the jar, everything went black...